“I’ll show you when we go back.”
Alan nodded, seeming satisfied. Soon the scout was docking to Raven and Moire forced herself to move.
“All right, everybody. Rack out. Six hours, and we’ll get back to work. You too, Alan.” Alan muttered something, then shouldered his gun and went in the direction of the cabin he shared with the other Created.
Gren sighed. “What are we going to do about the whatsit?”
I suppose I can’t pretend it isn’t there. “The commander and I are going to discuss that right now,” Moire said shortly. “After I set the security systems.”
Gren just gave her a look and grunted, but Ennis asked, “You still think there are others out there?”
She shrugged. “I’m not trusting the ship on the word of one guy and his trained crab. There have been too many surprises lately.”
When they got to the bridge, Moire checked the status of all the hatches and then activated the security systems. If anything tried to get in now, they’d know about it. She headed to the small captain’s office, Ennis following her. When he stepped inside she shut the door and turned to face him. He was watching her warily.
“We need him,” he said intensely, his voice low. “Do you have any idea how badly we…he’s communicating with us! He could have all kinds of useful data.”
“He’s probably a Bottle–Washer third class and can’t tell you anything important. Or won’t. The only communication system we’ve got is hardwired, has the vocabulary of a two–year–old child, and is generally not suited to convincing a crab carrier to hold their fire. I thought you wanted to get back as soon as possible. If we try to take him along now it could take almost a month to get something set up.”
More importantly, her crew might start complaining. They knew they didn’t have a lot of time to prepare Sequoyah’s defenses, and this current trip was really only justifiable since they could sell the ship they were fixing after Ennis was back at Fleet. They wouldn’t get anything from towing a crab ship or a prisoner.
She sat down, suddenly feeling tired. Why was she coming up with these half–assed objections? Of course Fleet needed any information the crab had. Even a crab janitor would be tremendously useful, and this crab seemed willing to go with them. And she would do it anyway, because Ennis wanted it so badly. She sighed.
“Look. How about taking lots of vid shots of the crab and the ship? We can’t move it yet anyway; it’s too large. He can go with the ship once we get it figured out.”
Ennis looked down at the deck, frowning. “Better if they’re kept separate. That way if anything happens, we don’t lose them both.”
Moire leaned back in her chair. “We’ll go out after we unload everybody tomorrow. Maybe we can convince the crab to come with us, and Perwaty—they must have some way to communicate without that scanner thing.”
“No.” His head jerked up; his eyes were fierce. “Not you.”
“But—”
“It’s too dangerous. You keep putting yourself at risk when you have everybody here depending on you. Your other pilot isn’t here, remember? What if the crab ship has traps? Or more crabs?”
Moire closed her eyes and took a deep breath, deliberately unclenching her fists. “Kilberton knows where we are. He knows how to get here. If we don’t leave soon, he’s going to be coming here anyway to see what’s wrong. Don’t tell me how to look after my crew! If they have a problem with the way I do things, they’ll tell me.” They probably would, too, once they found out about this.
Ennis spun around and leaned closer, breathing hard. “Your crew would follow you into a black hole just to see how you would get them out,” he said, each word bitten off. “If you told them they could breathe vacuum, they’d try it. Don’t go by their judgment.”
“What are you worried about?” Moire asked, trying to hang on to the tattered shreds of her temper. “Everybody here, including the crab, can survive without me. You can get your ship. They can get home. Or are you afraid I’ll miss the mutiny inquiry? Does Fleet really care if I die here instead of in front of their firing squad?” She was standing now, shaking with anger.
His face went white. “Don’t. Don’t say that!” Ennis grabbed her shoulders with painful strength. “They won’t, they can’t….” Just as suddenly he let go.
Moire stared at him, frozen with shock. His eyes were anguished. She felt like she had wandered into a minefield, and she wasn’t sure she could get out again even if she wanted to.
Ennis reached out and just touched the side of her face. “Moire, if you say it I have to listen,” he said in a low, rough voice. “I can pretend it isn’t there, but if you say it….” He swallowed.
She knew what she wanted to do, but the small voice of conscience was shrieking in the back of her mind, what about him? She should tell him to get lost. She should say it was none of his damn business. But it was too late for that, and had been for some time. She’d just refused to acknowledge it. The signs had been there. The way she was always aware of his presence. The way the bleak look in his eyes made her do everything she could to make it go away when she saw it. Now it looked like it wasn’t just her.
“Byron Ennis,” she said finally, “are you sure you know which side you’re on?”
His face twisted and he turned his head away. Without conscious thought she found herself reaching for him, torn by his pain. “It’s all right, it’s all right…it will be our own private war, we’ll figure it out somehow,” she whispered, holding him close. “Nobody else needs to know.”
He was clutching her as if he were drowning, and she could feel his rapid, gasping breaths. “I don’t want to have to choose,” he said, so softly she could barely hear him. “Please don’t make me choose….” His face turned to hers, and his kiss tasted of tears and desperation.
CHAPTER 11
A LITTLE FIXER–UPPER
Moire sat at Raven’s realspace controls, alternately watching the approaching hull of the salvage ship through the main viewport and Ennis out of the corner of her eye. He looked haggard and pale. She doubted he’d gotten any sleep. She hadn’t slept much herself, but she didn’t have to worry about inappropriate involvement with the object of a mutiny investigation. She just had to ignore various bodily impulses that said their encounter had been far too short and unsatisfactory.
They both had to do some thinking—with their brains—and decide what they were going to do. Neither of them had room on their schedules for more trouble. She had to get the construction of Sequoyah’s defenses going. He had to get back to Fleet with the crab data without getting killed. And if they pulled all that off, they were then going to find themselves on opposite sides of a court–martial. Not much chance of a happy ending for them there.
Gren came clumping in, and at her sign, shut the door to the bridge.
“How soon do you think you can get the ship pressurized?” Moire asked, her eyes back on the docking readouts.
“A few hours for the hull, then I’ll start testing. If we don’t have too many leaks, living quarters should be ready tomorrow,” Gren said.
Moire nodded without looking up, her fingers floating over the control board. She felt a faint shudder through the ship as the docking apparatus engaged. She flipped the switches for the interlocks, then spun her chair around. “Gren. We’re going to take the scout out to the crab ship for a while and investigate.”
Gren scowled. “Who’s ‘we’? And how am I going to get hold of you if I need to?”
“Me, Ennis, Perwaty, and his little friend. I’ll set the comm board to route any calls to Raven to the scout and then to our suit comms.”
Ennis drew in his breath. “Shouldn’t you stay…” He paused when she glared at him, then continued, hands spread before him to stop her objections. “We don’t know what’s on that ship. It would be a good idea to have someone as backup in case of trouble. You don’t need to go inside.”
“But I wan
t to.” Moire scowled. “You don’t have much choice, if we still want to keep this quiet. Besides the three of us, the only other member of the crew who knows is Alan. Gren needs to work on the salvage ship. You really want to go in there by yourself with Perwaty and the crab?”
“You should take Alan anyway, and stay on the scout,” Gren said in a growl, leaning over Moire with his hands on his hips. “Dammit, why do you always have to be the first into trouble?”
“She used to be a test pilot,” Ennis said quietly. “‘First into trouble’ is the job description. They don’t think about risk like normal people.”
Gren glanced at her for confirmation, and Moire nodded. “Before I joined NASA. Before…everything happened.” She grinned. “It was fun.”
Ennis and Gren exchanged resigned looks. Gren sighed. “Try and think of the rest of us, OK? You’ve convinced us to join this impossible crusade of yours, so you’d better stick around to help out.”
“All right, all right! What a bunch of wet blankets.” She muttered a curse under her breath. She knew they were right, which made it even more irritating. It wasn’t fair. Didn’t she get to have any fun? “Come on, let’s get going.”
She remained silent and annoyed as everyone suited up and filed out to the salvage ship. When Alan hesitated, looking at her and then at the departing crew, she motioned him over.
“You’re staying with me.”
He nodded, then glanced at her uncertainly. “You look mad. Did I do something wrong?”
Moire winced. “No, kid, you didn’t do anything wrong. I’m sorry. We’re going to look at…at some other ships, and I want your help.”
“Oh.” Alan bent to get a better view of her face through her helmet. She managed a smile for him, and he straightened and gave her a nudge with his shoulder.
“Let’s go tell Perwaty we’re going for a ride,” Moire said, and headed for the airlock. Alan was going to see the crab ship. Well, one thing was certain. She was going to see it for herself before they handed it over to Fleet, responsibility be damned.
They made their way to the connecting airlock to Helios and over the jury–rigged bridge. Alan punched the entry panel and they cycled through.
“At least he hasn’t bolted the door,” Moire commented. Inside, she opened her faceplate and shouted. “Hey, Perwaty! You awake?”
They started down the corridor. Perwaty was waiting for them at the bottom of the stairs, looking rumpled but remarkably cheerful.
“Good, you’re back! Radersent had a lot of questions about you. Every ten minutes, it’s ‘where Roberts, where Roberts.’”
“We’ve got some questions for him, too,” Moire said, following Perwaty. “You call him Radersent?”
“That’s what it sounds like to me when he said his name. Maybe it’s something else, but it works for now.”
The crab was visible at the viewport when they entered the room. He tucked his long head down as soon as he saw them.
“So when can we leave?” Perwaty asked, his pale eyes eager. “Need to get something set up for Radersent. He’s pretty clever that way. Didn’t take him long to get this place all working.”
Moire glanced at the viewport and the crab watching them. “That’s what we need to figure out. You may have to wait. We have to leave soon, and I still haven’t told my crew about him.”
Perwaty’s face fell. “How soon?” He looked worried again, and frightened.
“Tomorrow. First we want to check out Radersent’s ship, and we’d like him to come along. Can you tell him that?”
“Uh, sure!” Perwaty darted to his workbench and started tapping at the modified scanner at the end of the long cable. “You’re gonna come back for it—for us, right?”
“Yes.” Ennis replied immediately.
Moire nodded. “You can come with us now, if you want.”
Perwaty’s face worked, and he looked at the crab and then away. “I better stay with him,” he said quietly. “Guess I can wait a little longer. Least I get ta go home.” He glanced at the scanner. “He says he’ll go with us. How we getting there, Captain? I suppose you don’t want us going through the ship you’re working on, if your crew don’t know about him yet.”
Moire nodded. “Is there another exit on this ship, maybe up top? I’ll need to bring the scout in to pick you up, and there’s not enough room at this level.”
“Not that he can get to. His one arm doesn’t work, see. But there’s a main hatch on the other side that’s clear.”
“OK, we’ll meet you there.”
“Do you have something like that for when you’re outside?” Ennis asked, pointing at the communication system.
Perwaty shook his head. “No, and I’ve tried. Just can’t get the transmission protocols figured out. Mostly we talk before we go someplace, or just wave our hands or…or whatever.”
Moire rolled her eyes and sighed. “This is going to be an interesting trip.”
¤ ¤ ¤
Ennis adjusted the scope, scanning for any loose debris as well as the hatch where Perwaty and the crab were waiting. “There they are. Watch out for that beam, it’s right above the hatch.”
The scout slowly drifted toward the hatch. Moire had a frown on her face. “I don’t trust that hatch for docking, there’s damage around it. Open the airlock and throw them a line.”
Ennis got up and cycled through the scout’s airlock. The ship was very close, close enough to not really need a line, but he tossed them one anyway. Radersent came first. Ennis felt a chill seeing the alien so close, without any barrier between them. The crab version of a spacesuit looked like a collapsed, leathery balloon that folded about his body. It didn’t seem to have a separate helmet, unless the smoother, top part had that function. Three long, ropy extensions on either side of the head must match the crab’s tendrils, although he was fairly certain Radersent had more than that. Maybe this wasn’t his original suit.
The tendrils grasped the line, and the crab pulled himself into the airlock. Perwaty followed with the line itself. Ennis cycled them through to the ship. In gravity, the crab moved with a bobbing gait using his one working forelimb in rhythm with his hind legs. The crab was big—twice as wide as a human, and as tall when he had all his limbs on the ground.
“I don’t think we can strap him in anywhere,” Ennis said, watching the crab move cautiously into the scout. Moire nodded, her eyes on Radersent.
“He’ll just have to hunker down. I’ll hold off on the acrobatics.”
“Very considerate of you,” Ennis said dryly. “I doubt he wants any more injuries.”
“Yeah.” She looked thoughtful. “We can’t do anything to help him either, poor bastard. Unless he can translate one of their medical texts for us.”
She turned back to the pilot’s compartment. Ennis started to follow, but saw her twitch toward the passenger section and understood. Watch them.
It would be a good test of Radersent’s intentions, seeing how he behaved in his own ship. If he was going to try to trick them, it would be there.
“We’re coming up now,” Moire’s voice came through on his suit comm. “See if you can get him to show you where a hatch is.”
With Perwaty’s assistance and some hand–waving at the scout’s airlock, the crab eventually understood what they were asking. One suit tendril extended to indicate an indentation on the crab ship’s hull.
“Looks like that big dent on the side, about a third of the way down.”
“I see it. Stand by, I’m going to turn the ship.” The scout rotated gently, then drifted closer to the crab ship. “Why don’t you guys get in the airlock and tell me what’s there?”
He’d never been so close to a crab ship, even in combat. It seemed denser than a human ship somehow, the hull surface more like a rock than something made artificially. The entry was deeply recessed in the surface like a small tunnel.
“You can come in about three meters, but that’s it,” Ennis said, carefully check
ing the position of the scout.
“Three meters, OK. Can you get in?”
“Yeah, with a jump. I think we’ll….” He turned his head, seeing the crab move. Radersent stretched himself impossibly long, his suit stretching with him. He extended his one working forelimb to reach the deck of the crab ship and then folded his body to follow. His suit compressed to its original size again. “He’s on the ship! What’s he doing?” Ennis swung his weapon around, glimpsing Alan already taking aim from the cover of the outer airlock door.
But Radersent did not go any farther into the ship. With slow, careful movements, he bent his forelimb around what appeared to be an undulating fold in the wall of the tunnel. It pulled free, and as Radersent’s tendrils moved over its surface, it became long and pliable, like a cable. The crab pulled it forward, toward the scout, until the end floated in front of Ennis. Then he just stood there, waiting. Maybe it wasn’t an attack.
“What’s going on? Everything OK?” Moire’s voice was worried.
Ennis took a deep breath. “I’m not sure, but I think he’s just throwing us a line.” He reached out and grasped the cable, nearly dropping it when he felt it start to curve around his hand. A dark shape moved to take the cable—Radersent had come back. He seemed to be waiting for Ennis to do something. He thought for a moment. If it was a line, then it needed to be tied to the scout somewhere.
Ennis pointed to the cleat on the hull outside the airlock, and Radersent curved the cable around it. The tip of the cable kept moving after the crab had let go, winding tightly around the cleat and the cable itself.
“We seem to be attached,” he said finally. “I sure hope we can get this thing off again, though.” Ennis looked at the end of the tunnel. Some kind of structure was there, but he could only see it faintly. “We’re going to need some lights.”
A floodlight switched on overhead. “How’s that?”
He grinned. “Better. I think we’re ready to go in.” He felt his heartbeat accelerate.
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